Arthur Rex: Volume One

by J A Cummings

  “Why?”

  She picked herself up off of the ground and brushed off her scarlet skirt. “Why what?”

  “Why do you want this spring defended, and why only for that length of time?”

  She could have told him about prophecy, and about unalterable timelines, and her expectations of the future. Instead, she said, “I have my reasons, and they are not yours to know.”

  “Why must I kill good men?”

  “Because I have charged you to, and you are as ensnared as a rabbit in my trap.” She walked to him and took his beard in her hand, gripping it and with it his chin. “I have your soul for this time, Pellinore of Norgalis, and I will use it as I see fit. When you have killed the man I want to die, then I will tell you.”

  “Tell me his name,” he asked.

  “No.”

  “Tell me why -”

  “No! No more questions.” She released her grip on his face. “Do as I tell you, and in time, I will let you return to your kingdom and your life.”

  Pellinore collected his sword and put it back in its scabbard. He returned to the remnants of this tent, sorrowing. She watched him, amused by his suffering.

  “By the way,” she said, “your wife delivered a healthy little boy. She named him Lamorak.”

  He nodded, too despondent to rejoice. She left him with a smile.

  Din Eidyn rang with laughter as King Lot, much recovered at last, sat in his great hall, his beautiful queen at his side. A troupe of itinerant jugglers and acrobats had come to the castle and were performing for his court. His children, Gaheris and Agravaine, were entranced. Morgause’s sister, Morgana, haunted the edges of the celebration like an unwelcome ghost, but he could ignore her easily enough. His wife dangled little Gareth on her knee, and everything seemed happy.

  Somewhere, out there in the world, his oldest child and heir was lost. Gawain was lost to life, perhaps, and certainly lost to him. He still could not understand why his son had betrayed him so, but he had seen him on the field at Vinovia, fighting with Pendragon’s knights. He would have raised his sword against his own father, Lot was certain. It made his heart heavy with pain. He did not understand.

  Morgause said it was Merlin’s work, and he could certainly understand how that could be true. He had seen the ruthless druid at Pendragon’s side, and he was, no doubt, the so-called king’s puppet master. He could not believe that Pendragon could have fought so well at such a tender age without some magical assistance, and he refused to believe that any boy so recently in squire’s livery could have come so close to besting him. He had hurt the boy severely, and it was his sincere hope that he was lying in the clay. Time would tell.

  Outside the castle, the wind was picking up, and it smelled like snow. When he had been outside that day, he had scented the coming winter on the wind, and like a wolf, he knew that it was time to go to his lair and wait out the storm. He tried to think no further than the people in his keep, but his heart and his mind reminded him constantly that out there, somewhere in the coming winter’s cold, his oldest son was in someone else’s army.

  There could have been no other pain so bitter.

  Leodegrance knocked lightly on Guinevere’s door, and she looked up from her mirror. “Come in,” she said, while her lady in waiting returned to the business of removing the pearls that had been so carefully plaited into her long black hair.

  The doddering king, her loving guardian, entered her room with a smile. “Back from your swim, I see,” he said, sitting on the edge of her bed. “Did King Arthur take you to the river?”

  “He did,” she said, smiling. “And he joined me in it, too.”

  Leodegrance looked briefly surprised, then chuckled. “At your cajoling, no doubt.”

  “Of his own free will.” The last pearl dropped into the velvet-lined casket that she held, and she closed its hinged top with a click.

  “Do you like him?”

  She handed the box to her lady and thanked her for her assistance with a smile. The lady curtsied and left the room, leaving the two of them to speak in private.

  “I like him well enough, for a mortal boy.”

  “In a year and a half, he will be a man in years. I daresay he is a man already by his actions.”

  She sighed and waved a hand. “I tire of talking about his age. It’s all anyone says about him.”

  “Including yourself,” he pointed out. “As I recall, his age is your strongest objection to this arrangement.”

  Guinevere began to comb her hair now that the little braids were gone. “It was one of my objections,” she allowed. “Do you like him?”

  He considered her carefully, and she knew that if he were a younger man, he would have wanted her for himself. Perhaps he still did. “Does it matter?” he asked her finally. “You are the one who has to choose, as you are the one who will be bound by your decision.”

  She shuddered. “Bound,” she echoed. “What a horrible thought.”

  “Marriage is a serious commitment.”

  “As I well know.”

  “It’s more than nymph mating, my dear. It involves legalities, especially where the marriages of kings are involved.”

  She met the eyes of his reflection. “What legalities?”

  “The treaty agreement regarding mutual defense between your father’s realm and his, of course, and the usual matter of the dowry.”

  “I have no dowry. I’m valuable enough all on my own,” she said archly.

  He smiled. “If you insist. I believe that your father has sent along certain gifts that are to be given to the king if you accept him.” Guinevere huffed quietly, and he went on. “There are also expectations of a queen. Heirs, of course, and faithfulness. Infidelity by and with a queen is considered treason against the state.”

  “That’s stupid,” she opined.

  “One has to be certain that the queen’s children were sired by the king.”

  “So the throne passes from the father?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s also stupid. Mothers are the ones with the power, and queens are more valuable than kings.”

  “That is a faery opinion, my dear, but remember, your own Fey Lands are ruled by the Fey King.”

  She put down her ivory comb. “Not ruled. Administered. King Fergus Mor is the contact with the outside world, but Queen Urania is still the power in the lands.”

  Leodegrance bowed his head. “Of course. My apologies for my oversight.”

  She turned to face him. “Are you laughing at me?”

  “Not at all. This is a very serious matter, my dear.”

  “I know.” She went to the bed and sat beside him, curling her legs beneath her. “What do you think of him?”

  He considered for a moment. “I think he is a strong young man who is perhaps too much under Merlin’s thumb. He wants to break free, though, I can see it. He has ideas of his own, and that’s a good thing. He is a strong fighter and in excellent physical condition, so he will be healthy enough to keep up with you.” He smiled at her, and she smiled back. “I think he has a good heart and a ready mind. That’s something that can’t be taught.”

  “Can a king be unfaithful to his queen?” she asked.

  Leodegrance looked almost embarrassed as he answered, “Well, yes. The more virile the king, the stronger the kingdom.”

  “So he’ll be able to lie with anyone he likes, but I can only lie with him?”

  “That is the law.”

  She scowled. “I’ll say it again. That’s stupid.”

  “It’s only for his lifetime. When he passes away, you will be free to do as you wish, with whom you wish.”

  Guinevere imagined Arthur lying dead, and the sorrow she felt at the conjured image surprised her. Well, she thought, not wanting a person to die isn’t the same as wanting to be with them.

  “I will outlive him.”

  “By many centuries, yes.” He nodded. “And he is a fighter, and Britannia is ever prone to warfare. You will likely l
ose him while he’s still young.”

  “Will I be left on the throne, then? If he dies, will all of Britannia pass to me?”

  “Or to your son, if you have borne one.”

  “But not to a daughter?”

  He took a breath. “Yes, to a daughter, if that is all you have.”

  “And if he has a bastard son but I have a daughter, who would inherit?”

  “She would. A bastard cannot hold the throne. That is why his kingship is so disputed.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “Oh? He’s a bastard?”

  “He was conceived in bastardy, but born in the bonds of wedlock. Some say the time of conception is all, others say it is the time of birth that matters.”

  Guinevere could have answered her next question herself, but she asked, “And those who are holding to the time of conception all think they should be the High King instead of him?”

  “Yes.”

  She sighed. “It’s so much easier to be a sea nymph. We have our territories, and you defend what’s yours, and if someone stronger comes to take what you have, they take it. Easy. Simple.”

  “Might makes right?”

  “That’s a way to say it, yes. It’s the natural way of things.”

  He nodded. “Sometimes it’s better to withhold your might for the good of others.”

  “I know,” she said. “For children, when you’re raising them.”

  “And at other times, too. But that is a discussion for another day.” He took her hands. “Do you like him, Guinevere?”

  She considered the question with her heart and mind in concert, and she sighed. “Yes.”

  “Could you see yourself marrying him?”

  “I have to have sex with him first,” she said. “If he’s pathetic, I couldn’t live with that. I’m not going to be limited to one man who’s a terrible lover for the rest of my life.”

  Leodegrance chuckled. “I’m sure something can be arranged between the two of you.”

  “Tell me what his duties would be to me.”

  The king released his gentle hold on her hands and sat back. “He will pledge to honor and to respect you. To treat you with kindness and to protect you from assault and accusation by others. He will ride to battle to defend your honor, your family and your children. He will keep you in the manner that befits a queen, with fine things and good company and entertainment. He will sire your children and ensure that you and they are safe and sound and well provided for.” He smiled. “Much the same duty that any husband would owe to any wife.”

  “I want him to never lie to me,” she said. “I want him to promise me that.”

  “Personal agreements can certainly be made by the two of you...if he pleases you enough for you to choose him, that is.”

  Guinevere nodded, her mind mostly decided. “Thank you, Leo. I just have one more test, and then I will give you my answer.”

  She rose and walked toward the door, and Leodegrance said with amusement in his voice, “Off to seduce the king?”

  She opened the door and looked back at him with a smile. “Absolutely. And he had better not be disappointing.”

  Arthur tossed in his bed, punching the pillow that refused to conform to a shape that would be comfortable. The ropes that stretched taut beneath his mattress complained about his flopping, but he was out of sorts and didn’t care. He lay down with his back to the door, glowering at the wall.

  The hinges on the doorway squeaked, and he sighed. “I don’t want to talk anymore.”

  He expected Griflet, back to continue their argument, but instead Guinevere’s voice said, “Good. I don’t want to talk, either.”

  He sat up, surprised, and turned to look at her. She closed the door, then smiled at him, her face beautiful in the moonlight through the narrow window. With one hand, she untied the laces on the shift she wore, and it slid down off of her shoulders until it landed on the floor. Once again, she was revealed to him, and his mouth dropped open in admiration and dumbfounded shock.

  She drifted closer, and he found his voice. “Are you - my lady, I - are -”

  “Shh.”

  She came to the bed, and he moved the blanket out of the way so she could lie down beside him. He was naked beneath the covers, too, and now there was nothing between his body and hers. He shivered when her thigh brushed against his hip, and then she was sliding next to him, her eyes on his, daring him to do something.

  He was not entirely certain this wasn’t a dream. He leaned forward and took her mouth in a kiss, gentle at first, then with increasing passion. Her touch tingled like fire, and he felt every part of his body sparkle to life with it. His hand reached out and touched the skin of her flat stomach, stroking her lightly, and she shivered and made a little sound in her throat that he took as encouragement. Still kissing her, he moved his hand lower, past where there would have been dark hair on a human but where she was utterly bare, down to the place where moisture met his questing fingertips. He did not press inside, although he dearly wanted to feel her in that way. He stroked her instead, light as a feather, his fingers gliding over the velvety folds between her legs. She sighed and opened her thighs for him, pulling him over to lie atop her as she did. She was surprisingly strong, but he found it enticing and exciting, and he was already rigid with desire.

  Arthur kissed her more deeply still, his tongue inside her mouth while hers twisted around it in welcome. He parted the fleshy folds he was stroking and let one fingertip dance inside, just barely, just enough to feel the wet warmth that awaited him. He broke the kiss and moved his mouth to her long white neck, licking the tender skin before he proceeded down to adore her firm, round breasts with his lips and tongue. She arched against him and her hand cupped his buttocks, pulling him closer.

  He was happy to go where she was guiding him, and he slid into her with a sigh and a shudder of bliss. She exhaled once he was fully seated within her, and she smiled up at him.

  “Nice,” she whispered. “Very nice.”

  He found his voice enough to whisper back, “You feel amazing. I want you so much.”

  She chuckled and pulled on his hips. “Show me.”

  He tried to govern his pace, tried not to go to fast or too quick, but she felt like nothing he had ever experienced before. The tingling walls of her sex were nearly vibrating as she moaned in her pleasure, and the way she hooked her ankles at the small of his back made him nearly mad. He moved faster, harder, rocking against her and into her with abandon. She held his shoulders in her hands, then stroked his back and chest, tracing his muscles and feeling his body everywhere she could reach. She bent forward, her supple spine bending in ways he could not have expected, and she reached a finger down between his buttocks, teasing the opening she found there. He bucked at the touch, and she laughed in delight.

  “Love me,” she whispered into his ear. “Don’t hold back.”

  He groaned, and his mind relinquished control to the urges that sang in his blood. He pushed into her faster and faster, and she arched her hips and pushed against him, matching him thrust for thrust. He was lost in her, lost in the hot, clenching delight that was squeezing him all along his length. He moaned against her shoulder, and she put a hand into his hair, her fingers tangling in his black curls.

  She made a tiny pleasure sound, and then she growled. She nipped the side of his neck, and he suddenly remembered the long teeth she’d used to kill the fish in the river. It was a startling mental image, but somehow at that moment, the thought of her burying those points into his flesh was the most erotic thing he had ever known.

  They strove together, thrusting and purring and calling out in joy, until he could contain himself no longer. He thrust one last time, as deep as he could go, and he released into her. She quivered around him and shouted, holding him so tightly he could not have left her even if he’d wanted to. She rubbed against him, grinding her pelvis against his as he was buried deep within her. She shook and wailed, her body shaking beneath his hands. He thought everyone i
n the castle must have heard her, and in that moment, the thought made him proud.

  They stayed locked together for a long time, their bodies shuddering, sheened with sweat and flushed with a rosy afterglow. When he finally slid from her body, she groaned in disappointment and rolled with him until he lay on his back and she rested her head upon his chest.

  She tangled her fingers in the hair above his manhood, stroking and combing it as if it were a curiosity. He lay still, his chest heaving, staring up at the ceiling in mindless happiness. She moved to encircle his waist with her arm, and she fell asleep almost immediately, wrapped around him. Arthur stroked her arm as he too fell into deep and happy dreams.

  Sir Gawain walked through Eburacum in the darkness of the night, bored and lonely. Everyone he knew was asleep, as he knew he should have been, as well. No one in this place spoke the tongues of his homeland, either Gaelic or Norse, and he found that the difference between his age and Owain’s made the boy dull company. He had attempted to speak to Prince Constantine, who was ostensibly to be his mentor as a knight, but the Armorican had no time for him, preferring to spend his hours in the baths with Lord Esclabor of Babylon and his Greek slave, Alexios. Gawain had been invited to join their sport, but the flesh of men held no sexual appeal to him, so he had declined.

  King Gurgurest had not made himself available to his noble guests except for Owain, to whom he had taken a liking. He had the young prince at his side most of the time, teaching him and talking to him, showing him how he ran the kingdom. Gawain had already received those lessons from his own father, and Gurgurest’s unctuousness annoyed him. He chose not to spend time there, either.

  As with most days like this, his feet took him to the stable and Gringolet, his one true friend. His horse greeted him with a soft snort, walking slowly to the door of the stall, his nose stretched out toward him. Gawain stroked him, then stopped the night watch groom to ask for a carrot. An orange stub with the greens still attached was provided, and he gave it to Gringolet, who ate it happily.